


if you could let me inside your heart (would i be enough?)

by teamfreehoodies



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety Attacks, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, M/M, Multi, Not Actually Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:01:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25980283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teamfreehoodies/pseuds/teamfreehoodies
Summary: Post-coital realizations should really not be had alone. AKA: Jaskier questions his place between these two powerful, immortal, destined-to-be-together beings, and he finds it hurts to be just… human.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Comments: 24
Kudos: 310
Collections: Polyamorous Relationships For the Win





	if you could let me inside your heart (would i be enough?)

The thing is— Jaskier’s not a fool. _Oh,_ he plays into the perception that he’s just a foppish dandy, chasing skirts and singing songs for coin, and he lets people believe that’s all he cares about. It’s easier, in a lot of ways, if no one goes looking any deeper. When the general image of you is as of someone wearing their literal heart on their sleeve, everyone believes that they know the _truth_ , and so there is no suspicion of anything deeper going on. It’s a useful deflection, especially when you live a life as surrounded by powerful people as Jaskier does. No one goes looking for secrets from an open book— what would interest them of someone who gives away everything so freely?

It’s useful, truly, but it’s exhausting as well, and Jaskier has been hiding this particular secret for so long that he’s almost fooled himself into believing it. The number one rule of any ruse: the minute you start believing your own bullshit it’s time to get out. Yennefer makes a quiet noise, then resettles her sleeping body against Geralt, shifting beneath the thin sheet that covers her. It’s the only barrier between them right now; Geralt and Yennefer had both fallen asleep almost immediately after they’d finished, and Jaskier had been the only one awake enough to clean up. He twists the damp rag in his hands, staring down at the two of them, curled around each other like closed parentheses; a completed set, matched so well to each other; if Yenn is fire, then Geralt is ice, and there is no room for a foppish bard with dreams beyond his station in between.

He should leave. He’s under no pretensions that what they’d shared had been anything more than just sex for the sake of it; he knows his body is desirable, knows too that Geralt and Yennefer both enjoy sex that tilts more into adventurously kinky than anything soft or sacred. (Geralt has told him about the unicorn, and while that sounds mostly impractical to Jaskier, a little part of him has to admit that it’s also fucking _hot_ , which… well, that’s Yenn all over.) He knew, even before they turned their gaze on him in the tavern last night, that this wasn’t going to be a romantic declaration of love, knew, even before any one of them got undressed that this was going to hurt, that it would ruin him, the way that nothing else could.

This is a secret he’s kept for twenty-five years now, that he loves Geralt; for two, that he loves Yennefer. What a pathetic thing he is, to fall in love with the only two people on the entire damned continent who are perfect for each other, and each other alone. Destiny bound them together, and for his meddling he’s been punished. There’s no space for him in their epic love story, literally written into the very fabric of the universe, a tale so perfectly concocted that their binding would always lead them to each other, no matter the distance or the difficulty in reuniting. It’s the most romantic thing Jaskier can imagine, him with all his learning and all his poetry and nothing could ever compare to the simple truth of fate herself bending an ear to these two: powerful and immortal and meant for each other. What is he compared to that? A willing fuck, a distraction, a kinky notch in the bedpost, to be used and discarded and then _forgotten_ , eventually, as time ages his body and ignores them entirely.

There’s a traitorous lump pushing its way up Jaskier’s throat and his eyes are burning with held-back tears. He’s forty-three damned years old, too old to be crying like a child denied an extra helping of dessert. Is it not enough that he has their friendship? Is it not _enough_ that they held him between them and took their pleasure from his body, gave him pleasure in return? Is it not _enough_ that he has this, at least, has their esteem, their trust, their love, even if it’s not the form he wants it? Is he truly so selfish, so pathetic and _ugly_ and _small_ that he would cry over not being given something that was not his to demand in the first place?

A single tear falls from the tip of his nose, splashing against the rag he is still worrying in his hands, and he would laugh if he weren’t so afraid of waking them. Of course, _of course he is_. He’s a fool and a foppish dandy, chasing skirts and singing songs for coin, and the only person he’s ever fooled is himself.

He has to laugh, he thinks, wiping his tears from his face, because this is just like him isn’t it, to be so distraught after what was by all accounts a wildly pleasurable evening. Only he could turn something so _good_ , so _bad_ with just a few seconds of thinking too hard. He tosses the rag aside, slightly grossed out now to still be holding it, and then slips his clothes back on, quietly, because if he’s going to break down and have a proper cry about his traitorous broken heart he’s _certainly_ not going to do it naked. 

He’s short of breath and there’s a horrid keening wail trapped in his throat and he’s a fucking actual functioning adult he should not be going into a fit of histrionics because— because what? Because he’s _unloveable?_ Because he’s mortal and pathetic and _small_ and _fucking stupid_ and he should have known better, because Geralt hadn’t even wanted him as a traveling companion and because Yennefer hadn’t ever _tried_ to hide how little she thought of him. The world is blurry through his tears and he only just makes it to the door before the first sob bursts free and he’s not as quiet as he should be when he leaves, but he just hopes it was silent enough to offer him a clean break. By the time he descends the stairs he’s running because _he can’t be here_. This is embarrassing, is so far _beyond_ embarrassing that’s he’s come out the other side and he wants to die with the shame of it all.

(This is not the first of these attacks, where a wild sadness comes up and steals his reason, makes him weak and pathetic and useless, unable to be calmed down— but it’s the first in a while, in such a long time he’s forgotten how bad they could be and he hates it because he knows, very distantly in the part of his brain that isn’t functioning right now, that he’s overreacting. He knows that these thoughts aren’t true, but they _feel_ real and he can do little else but ride it out until it’s gone and hope no one finds him in the meantime.)

He stumbles into the stables, wanting to be alone but also desperate for a corner to put his back against: it’s early enough in the pre-dawn hours now that the stable hands are all gone, so it’s just him and the horses. He fumbles with the latch for Roach’s stall door, still keening noiselessly because he doesn’t actually have enough air to make any sound at all right now and because it’s early and he doesn’t want to wake anyone and because he needs to hide until this passes, and his hands are shaking too much to get the metal bolt to slide out, and what the fuck kind of door is this anyways, it’s not like a stall door needs a complicated bolt mechanism, it’s just keeping fucking horses in place it’s not protecting anything fucking important— he kicks the door, _utterly suddenly furious_ and then he punches it too, just once, rabbit quick with clenched fists, and Roach screams, startled and scared of him and _gods_ he’s ruining _everything._

He can’t be here— he shouldn’t be here. “I’m sorry, Roach” he means to whisper but it’s a garbled mess around the sobbing breaths his body is shaking apart around and then, because the universe hates him and exists to laugh at his pain, he runs face first into Geralt as he’s trying to leave. 

He’d been so quiet, and then he’d ruined it, scaring Roach, and of course Geralt was here to check on her, because he loved Roach and he loved Yennefer and he hated Jaskier, could barely tolerate him, just let him follow him around because it was easier and he was too nice to tell him off. Geralt was sleep-rumpled still, and he’d pulled on trousers but no shirt, just his stupid witcher’s medallion sitting against his bare chest (the bare chest that Jaskier has just bounced off of, and that he’d spent several long, glorious minutes exploring with his tongue last night) and his misery is renewed again as Geralt rubs one hand across his eyes and then notices Jaskier finally.

“Jask?” He asks, and Jaskier has one shining moment of hope where he thinks maybe Geralt hasn’t noticed and then Geralt has both hands on his shoulders and is trying to meet his eyes even as Jaskier looks away. “Jaskier, what’s wrong.” He shakes his head, pushing his lips together to try and hold back everything. He can’t speak, can’t admit to the truth of how fucking stupid he is, and now that he’s been found he feels even stupider, that he couldn’t just— hold it in long enough to hide it. He shakes his head, and then keeps shaking it, even as Geralt pulls him into his chest. He’s warm and broad and Jaskier doesn’t deserve this, but he needs it too so he lets himself fall apart in Geralt’s arms. It’s not like Geralt can think any less of him, he thinks slightly hysterically. 

He starts laughing, and then he can’t stop, a series of hiccoughing sobs that Geralt just shushes him through. “Jask, what’s wrong?” Geralt asks again, and the ‘nothing’ gets trapped in his throat so he’s so glad when Geralt just pushes his face into his shoulder and then picks him up. Geralt is taking him back to the inn, back to Yennefer and he can think of few things more immediately humiliating than letting Yennefer see him like this, so he tries to synch his breathing to Geralt’s. One of the better effects of being a witcher is that Geralt’s breathing is steady as a metronome, and Jaskier has used it to keep time while practicing out in the woods more than once. 

He hides his head in Geralt’s shoulder as they enter the room again, and he’s stopped crying, has calmed down from the worst of it just through proximity, (because Geralt makes him feel safe, like nothing else does, and if he can’t feel cherished, at least he can feel that). He thinks, inanely, that if he just... keeps hiding he can survive this with some measure of dignity intact. Maybe Yennefer is still asleep, and Geralt will lie down between them and he can just... pretend this didn’t happen in the morning. He holds onto that thought all the way up until Geralt actually sets him down on the bed, and then Yennefer is suddenly all over him. She rolls him over so he’s on his stomach, and he’s half afraid of what she’s going to do, but all she does is climb on top of him so her weight is distributed across as much of him as possible. She’s smaller, but there’s still a whole human laying across his back and her breasts leave a soft cushion across his shoulders, her knees just pressing this side of uncomfortable into the back of his thighs. Her weight pins him in place, a comforting pressure that he wants to lean into. She’s still mostly naked, but he can feel that she’s wearing Geralt’s shirt, the extra fabric wrinkling oddly against his back. He shoves his head into the mattress, but then one of Yennefer’s hands is gliding through his hair, petting against the grain, and he shivers with the pleasure of her touch. Geralt sits next to them, and he’s... there’s no word for what he’s doing except petting, rubbing his rough hands up and down Jaskier’s calves, pressing in just enough to smooth the tension out of his muscles. 

He’s melting under their ministrations, and he’s half-asleep when Yennefer drops a kiss against his cheek. “What’s wrong, bardling?” she whispers and it's not even really a pet name, but it’s the softest she’s ever been with him, and he shudders roughly, pushing through the instant flush of embarrassment because he thinks he owes them some explanation doesn’t he. “I-” he cuts himself off, because how does he put this into words that don’t make him sound ungrateful? “I just... got scared,” he says, half a whisper, because he can’t say it any louder. 

“Oh, it’s okay, little bardling,” Yennefer croons in his ear, and it should be humiliating to have her call him small, to be using such a voice, yet it does nothing but soothe him further, her weight across his back, the soft petting from both her and Geralt, the silent steadiness of Geralt sitting next to them. Geralt stretches out to lie with them, and he reaches out one hand to tap gently at Jaskier’s cheek until he opens his eyes enough to meet his golden gaze. 

“What were you scared of?” he asks, and _gods_ what a gut-punch of a question that is. They’ve trapped him in their embrace and he won’t be able to wriggle out without answering. He can’t deflect here, and he thinks, perhaps uncharitably, that this has Yennefer written all over it. 

“I didn’t—” he can’t say, physically can’t make the words leave his mouth, but Yennefer must be using magic to read what he means to say anyways because she tuts, lowly, and then kisses the back of his neck, nuzzling into his nape. He gasps with the sudden pleasure, and then Geralt leans forward to steal a kiss from his lips (and the angle is weird and it should be uncomfortable for both of them but it’s so godsdamned good because it's them, because it's always good between them). Yennefer and Geralt pull back at the same time, and then Yennefer has his chin in one hand and she too drops a kiss against his mouth, (this angle is even more awkward, but the slight twinge in his neck is worth it for how fucking sweet she tastes, like gooseberry jam and burnt sugar and just that hint of Chaos, swirling around everything she does). 

“I love you,” she says, when she pulls back, and he blinks, absolutely stunned by the bareness of it. She’s not holding anything back and he wants to revel in the feeling of it, but it's so sudden he— “Hey,” she says, cutting off his thoughts. “Don’t do that. I love you, and if you think you’ve been hiding how much you love us, you clearly don’t listen to your songs.” She smirks at him as he gapes at her because what a bald-faced insult, doesn’t listen to his own songs, what a _load of cock_ , he knows exactly how obvious he’s been in his lyrics, he just rather hadn’t thought _they_ were listening close enough to know. Geralt laughs, a rough sound that sends a low thrum of arousal straight to the base of him, and then he presses a gentle kiss to Jaskier’s temple and _oh gods_ , that's so gentle, he’s so gentle with him and Jaskier wants to cry all over again, but this time from happiness. 

“I love you too, Jask,” he whispers and then, smirking, because he is, above all else, a right fucking bastard, he reaches around Yennefer to slap Jaskier’s ass. “Go the fuck to sleep now, I’m tired.” Jaskier gasps, scandalized, but then Yennefer is sliding off him, laughing also, and she crowds up against his back, pushing him into Geralt’s arms.

“Cuddle your witcher, bard. You made him all sad earlier when you left. You’ve gotta fix him now.” Yennefer says, pushing him with both arms into Geralt’s embrace. Geralt nods, very seriously, and Jaskier goes easily enough, laughing the whole time. 

“Oh, what a burden I bear,” he says, letting both of them wind thier limbs around him. “Do you feel cured, witcher?” he asks, smiling against Geralt’s collar bone. 

“With you two in my bed?” Geralt rumbles, releasing one hand from Jaskier’s waist to wind his fingers together with Yennefer’s. Their joined hands pull tight against Jaskier’s hip and he feels held by both of them, cocooned between their bodies and safe and welcome the way he’s always craved. “How could I ever be anything else?”

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for Geraskefer week over on tumblr [(come say hi!)](https://teamfreehoodies.tumblr.com/) and originally it was split across two days, pining and soft, so have a mix of both of those here. This is the closest I've ever come to writing anything sex-adjacent and (I think???) it's the first kiss I've ever written so if it's horrible that's why. Thank you for reading!


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